Campus officials blamed water damage, but recently obtained emails show a contentious, $45,000 anti-coal sculpture at the University of Wyoming was removed way ahead of schedule because of the controversy it generated.
University of Wyoming officials had tried to blame a water line rupture and subsequent damage for the reason the 36-foot-wide, $45,000 sculpture “Carbon Sink: What Goes Around, Comes Around” was dismantled a year ahead of schedule – but a series of emails published Sunday by Wyoming’s Casper Star-Tribune paint a different scenario:
The decision to remove the flat whirlpool of coal and charred Wyoming wood sinking into the earth was the last in a number of steps top university officials took to calm angry state legislators, energy industry donors and trade group representatives. …
(The sculpture was) a large swirl of charred, beetle-killed wood and chunks of coal, a meditation on the evolution of the geological and natural cycle of life. It was part of a temporary art exhibition arranged by the University of Wyoming Art Museum.
Whatever the artist’s original goals for the piece, it looked anti-coal. It seemed to forge a link between coal and environmental destruction and seemed like a visual rebuke to the coal industry in a state where coal mining employs thousands and pay millions in taxes, royalties and fees. …
But some good has come out of this all. The article ends with this little zinger:
University workers removed the wood and coal, and filled the circle of earth with sod. …The coal, mined and sold from Black Hills Corp.’s Wyodak mine near Gillette, was burned for heat in the university’s central energy plant.
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